


Biting (Both Franken and Otherwise)

by sexonastick



Category: UnREAL (TV)
Genre: F/F, Monumental Mistakes, Quinn King Level Offensiveness, Rachel Goldberg Level Fucking Up, Reality TV, Stupid Life Decisions From Otherwise Genius People, Two Idiots Being Dumb
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-03
Updated: 2016-06-02
Packaged: 2018-07-11 21:31:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7071166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sexonastick/pseuds/sexonastick
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>To Frankenbite is to take fragments of words and parts of ideas out of context to create something entirely new.</p><p>To bite off more than you can chew is to get yourself underneath a situation (person) that you can't really handle or hold onto.</p><p>Rachel Goldberg and Quinn King really excel at both.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. pilot season

Rachel isn’t sure which one of them she’s trying to punish when she and Quinn start having sex. It’s not like it’s a relationship or something. Neither of them do that, right, they are the mistresses and the mistakes.

They’re both good at making mistakes, so they try each other on for a while in the off season. 

It’s not like she’s totally forgiven her for the thing with Adam. That thing where Quinn lied. 

Not that Rachel should be surprised, since that's what Quinn does. She lies about everything. 

And to be clear, the lie wasn't what she said to Adam, no, because he's the talent and that Rachel could forgive. She might even be impressed. Producing pretty faces is what they do, and she so seldom gets to really watch Quinn at work.

But the part where Quinn lied to her too, well. That's less forgivable, or at least harder to trust. Because she doesn’t think Rachel’s okay, she’s not fine, she’s a disposable and unreliable basket case whose problems can be dragged out onto the living room floor whenever it’s convenient.

So yeah, consider it a problem, consider it a big one, and Rachel isn't over it. It's not her job to forgive and forget. Her job is to make sure people never forget. Her job is to dig up all the dirty things someone doesn't like about herself, pull them out into the light of day, and then dig just a little bit deeper. 

Sleeping with Quinn is the easiest way to get her back, honestly. 

Nobody walks away from Rachel Goldberg without a few scars of their own.


	2. color palettes: shades of bruising

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for the usual level of potentially offensive Quinn King comments.

*

It's not as though the thought had never crossed Quinn's mind before. She's not blind. 

Goldie is hot. She always has been.

But she's also an employee, a direct subordinate, and what kind of asshole would Quinn be if she took advantage of a thing like that? 

Chet. She would be Chet.

So she's kept her hands and her mouth to herself. She might be somebody's mistress (or was), but she's still big on monogamy. 

But now that's all out the window. No wedding or fairytale for Quinn King, not that anyone's surprised. The wicked queen doesn't get the happy ending, after all. 

*

But now Rachel is no longer an employee, at least. More like an equal. Co-creator and shared in showrunner duties. 

Her first big wide-eyed suggestion, coming up from under Quinn's desk (like that's a negotiation tactic or something), is to replace Graham with someone else for their spin-off.

"Why not a woman?"

"A female host." Quinn purses her lips and tries not to show her disapproval too quickly. Rachel's own mouth is red and swollen; it's kind of cute. She'd hate to kill the mood. "How often do you think that works out?"

"What, women in television?" Rachel's grin is eager, playful and exuberant as she grips both of Quinn's knees. Maybe that's a tactic too. "Because I think I'm clearly proof that there's room for expansion." 

She's playful in the same way she is with the girls on their shows. 

Which means Rachel is trying to produce her, and it turns out that Quinn isn't the one to kill the mood. Suddenly, she feels gross. Exploited and gross. 

Chet was always too clumsy to even try pulling something like this off, so it's actually a new feeling. One Quinn definitely doesn't like. "You know what, get up." 

At least the surprise that registers on Rachel's face is genuine. "Sorry?"

"Don't pull that kind of crap with me, Rach. I know your tricks, alright? You were doing that thing."

"What--"

"The thing!" Quinn feels an exasperating desire to wave her hands around, but she thinks that might make her point lose impact. She scowls instead. "You know the one. You do it with your eyebrows."

"My eyebrows are perfectly sincere," Rachel says, although her expression has slackened somewhat. She's slipping back into the real her. The one she usually wears when she's in Quinn's office these days. 

When she's not trying to get something she wants. 

(Other than sex. Goldberg knows exactly how to ask for sex. She really is a filthy girl; that letter to Jeremy was not a one time thing.) 

"Don't play me, okay? I'm not a contestant, alright, I'm your--" Obviously the right word to say here is not girlfriend. Not just because of the way Rachel stills at even the unuttered syllables, but also because of all those untrue implications. They aren't girlfriends. 

Some days lately, Quinn's not sure that they're still friends, assuming they ever were. Rachel used to be less guarded around her, at least some of the time. Now the only time she drops her walls down is right after she comes, sweaty hair plastered to her throat and jaw as she slumps in Quinn's lap.

That's one way it's happened. Also over the desk. And on the sofa.

Basically every surface of Quinn's office. 

And quite a few in her house. Once Goldie eventually let it slip that she was living out of an equipment van -- Quinn had half a mind to charge her rent retroactively, just to punish her for being such a stubborn little shit -- it only made sense for her to move in. Quinn's place is huge after all, and Rachel is a tiny little person. She fits.

It's scary some days how easily she fits.

"I'm your coworker."

*

They have dinner together some nights. Most nights. There isn't a lot to do at the office when it's still this early in pre-production and Quinn can't even avoid coming home with lies about being overbooked for the day when Rachel has her schedule memorized.

She's figured out everyone's schedule actually. It's almost freaky.

Chet certainly never did it. No one Quinn has been with before has ever studied her so thoroughly, like a puzzle to be pulled apart, pieces rearranged. If she's not careful, she could end up as Goldberg's very own Picasso.

It becomes something close to routine, the kind of things that couples do.

It's easy, in a lot of the same ways that Goldie is herself.

Hard in those ways too.

*

"What can I say, it's a gift," Rachel says one night as she pours herself another glass of wine. 

They have been talking about something else, of course; not Rachel's creepy capacity for memorizing all things Quinn. (Creepy is the only word for it.) The actual topic of conversation for now is how quickly Rachel has placed the new second unit cameraman under her thumb. 

The guy is on set shooting b roll for half a day and he's already all moon eyed over every little thing Rachel says. The way she laughs and gives his arm a squeeze. Those little dimples she gets in her cheeks. 

It's nauseating.

Quinn gingerly flattens the edges of her dress, as though making certain all her pieces are still in the right place. "What, making men want to fuck you? That's a gift alright, Rachel, it's called nice tits and a firm ass." She laughs into her own glass of wine, but Rachel isn't laughing. 

Her expression is pinched.

"You're jealous," she says, her voice lifting up into another register. 

It's unsettling to hear it, a shift of rising emotions, and Quinn feels compelled to combat it by being exceptionally flat as she straightens her shoulders out into a near perfect line. "I don't _get_ jealous. You're deluded."

"Oh, am I?" Rachel's voice has taken on a spiteful, sing-song quality. Her lips twist in a sneer and Quinn wants to wipe the expression right off her mouth, primarily by using her own. 

Or she would, if she wasn't so pissed off, because of course Rachel is right. She's jealous. 

Quinn is jealous of a middle-aged overweight balding _asshole_ who can only get work as a second unit shooter taking locked off shots of sunsets and crashing waves. How pathetic. 

Whatever her relationship with Rachel is about, it's not this. At least, it's not supposed to be.

Feeling inadequate in the face of such utter mediocrity was meant to be behind her. Far back in the past where she allowed herself to actually fall for the kinds of people with the same capacity for empathy or compassion as some lower forms of fungus. More specifically the kind of fungus you might find on a man's unwashed balls. 

Chet is like ball fungus, basically, and Goldberg isn't a whole lot better. 

This is meant to be purely physical, the kind of sex that doesn't result in developing feelings that might interfere with work, which is why it's especially easy for Quinn to snap, "Take off your god damn pants," with just the right amount of commanding annoyance. 

Rachel grins and bites her lower lip, twirling the wine around in her glass. She's coy, as if this was her plan all along. 

So Quinn doesn't really feel bad when she moves around to the other side of the table and pulls Rachel up out of her seat by the front of her v-neck. They both collide against the table, briefly, and she hopes she leaves bruises against the front of Goldberg's pale thighs. 

She certainly intends to leave a few on her breasts.

*

Compromise. All partnerships are about that, whether it's a real relationship -- even marriage, or so Quinn is told -- or the far more important working relationships that give birth to the kinds of babies that might make you millions of dollars. 

Everything takes compromise.

*

The current compromise is a swimsuit model co-host. 

Quinn waited until Rachel had just finished coming (clawing at her back) to let that one slip, and from the look on Rachel's face she might as well have punched her in the jaw. 

"Do you not even want to make a different show?" she said, the anger more apparent in her voice than usual. 

Rachel is the most herself with someone else still inside her too, taking up space. It makes all her pretense of calm slip away, just like she tries to shove Quinn herself back. "Because if we're just going to make Everlasting again, I'm not sure you even need me here."

"Are you kidding? Without you to leave stains on my leather upholstery, how would I survive?" Quinn deadpans sharply, because she has tried hard to create an amiable solution, something for the both of them, and Rachel is just the kind of spoiled brat who would toss all that work aside. 

Why is she so attracted to emotionally stunted idiots?

*

The next day, with her sunglasses on at breakfast (it must have been a long night of drinking in the second bedroom), Rachel says she'll start taking casting calls for models. 

"And make sure you find someone who likes dick, okay?" 

Rachel sets her glass down sharply, with a low clattering. She huffs out slowly. "I'm sorry, what?"

"You heard me."

"I did." Rachel's fingers fidget around the rim of her coffee cup. "But I'm not sure I understood."

"We don't want another Graham situation," Quinn answers, barely containing her long suffering sigh. But just barely. "You were right. So we need a girl who won't _sleep_ with the contestants." 

"But you like dick." 

"What?" Quinn is startled enough by the response that she actually looks up from her scattered piles of paperwork. Budgets with red lines criss-crossing over columns. "What does that mean?"

Rachel shoves the sunglasses up on top of her head, although she's squinting. "I thought it was pretty clear." 

"Obviously not." 

They stare at each other for a long stretch of silence and then Rachel's sunglasses drop back down over her eyes. She looks away, focused on spreading cream cheese on her bagel. 

"Sure, I'll handle it. Find some nice, straight model with blonde hair and huge tits who would never sleep with another employee." She takes a single, large bite and wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. "What kind of monster does a thing like that?" 

*

Quinn is pretty sure that there isn't actually anything like monsters in the real world. (Not even the Real World, although that's closer.) 

That's just another simple idea that people like them had to come up with to make sense of life for normal people whose brains are too small to wrap around reality. Just like love or loyalty. Concepts that are too crisp and clean to be real.

All the bullshit has to come from somewhere.

Real emotions are cloudy and difficult to describe. Good TV emotions are like verbs. Hate, lust, love, hurt.

Fuck, punch, break, cry. They make life seem simple. The good and the bad. The right and the wrong. You know what you're supposed to be feeling because the music tells you to. Carefully constructed scenarios give you your villain to root against, so that you know you're always on the side of right. 

Quinn understands the appeal of it, of course. 

Everyone's favorite lies are the ones about the hopes they still have for their own future. What is television if not an endless lie about human beings as a whole? What we like to think we're capable of at the end of the day, when the chips are down. The ways that we'll come through for one another.

It's not likely. Quinn has seen it all in action. How easily they make the girls come undone. How hard it is to get them to make the moves that might actually improve their lives or, god forbid, someone else's.

Good TV depends upon the lies we're willing to tell just to get through the day.

*

An easy lie to tell is how you dress.

Goldie isn't going to be field producing anymore, not regularly anyway, so there's no more need for those ratty hoodies and jeans that look like she's worn them every day for four years. (Given her recent desire to live inside the back of a van, that might even be the case.) 

Quinn buys her things. Clothes. 

It's not like Chet and the house or the job. This isn't about money or power in exchange for sex. Quinn would be doing this for her anyway, because they're partners now working to give birth to a billion dollar baby.

It doesn't exactly hurt that Rachel cleans up well. Not just those sweaters and little strappy dresses she used to wear when she would want middle-class losers to hit on her at bars or barmitzvahs, but in the kinds of clothing a professional woman wears when she wants to make it clear she's ready and able to bust anybody's balls if necessary. (It's almost always necessary.)

Quinn sets Rachel up with a wardrobe anyone could be proud of. Goldberg's first paycheck as executive producer is enough to afford all the tailored pants and jackets she'll need for the barrage of network meetings lined up over the next few months.

"I said, trust me, right? You look amazing."

"I look like you," Rachel answers, although she laughs and looks almost ready to wink at the end. (Always producing people.)

Quinn smirks, but it's without some of its usual edge. "Exactly, like I said. Amazing."

Rachel rolls her eyes, but doesn't dispute it. She understands the power of image. There's a reason she's one of the best in the whole god damn business. Watching the way she fixes her hair and adjusts herself in the mirror is like a mini masterclass in manipulation. Give her ten minutes and the right options and she can change herself completely.

People have got the wrong idea about evolution. The truly amazing changes didn't need to take place over billions of years or in a petri dish. Come to a set during hard night when there's only a couple hours left to shoot and see what her girl can do to change other people in only a matter of minutes.

Rachel catches Quinn watching in the mirror and shifts her weight deliberately to the other leg, hair falling in her face and hip creating a stark contrasting curve against the half-untucked button up.

Quinn can't help herself. She's up out of her chair in moments, placing one hand exactly there to help tuck Rachel in.

"Better?"

Her throat is dry, making the word feel round and full against the back of her teeth and over her tongue. Heavy.

She wonders if Rachel can hear it.

"Oh, yeah," Rachel breathes back, their eyes locking in the mirror. (Yep. She definitely hears it.) "Amazing. Like you said."

The pointed edges of Rachel's smirk are back, so sharp that Quinn feels sure she would cut herself if she tried to touch again now and so she pulls away instead, plucking a sheer white shirt with a cascading neckline from the pile on the ground and offers it to Rachel without looking.

Their fingers brush against each other as Rachel disappears inside the dressing room.

*

Compromise. 

So when Rachel still wears the slouchy jeans and t-shirt around the house, Quinn doesn't complain. She sort of likes it. 

There's something that feels right about finding Goldberg with her feet propped up on the sofa, hoodie slumped around her shoulders, and her eyes glued to a book in her lap. It's something on gender politics in America.

Quinn feels bored just looking at it, but she smiles a little watching Rachel's eyes trace along the page. "Is it brilliant? You look practically horny, Goldberg."

Rachel blinks and takes a moment to realize and look up. She shrugs. "It's overwritten and kind of pretentious." 

Quinn can't help but laugh. She likes that answer even more.

*

Quinn arranges to have herself interview the prospective hostesses while Goldberg watches tape after tape of potential contestants. She has a good eye for crazy, that's all.

There's no other reason Quinn would want to keep her out of the room filled with bulimia thin girls and their double-Ds.

None.

*

The girl Quinn picks on both their behalf went to a prestigious college -- but not an all girls one because, again, love of dick is important here -- before she dropped out to become the face of a perfume brand in Australia. Not exactly the brightest of the bunch or the most recognizable face, but then neither was Graham when they first got their hands on him.

The point has to be a person made of putty. Someone they can mold.

Not that it's enough to impress Rachel.

"Wait, which college?"

"Oh, I don't know." Quinn waves her hand dismissively. "It wasn't Trump University, so what does it matter?"

"... are you sure it was even accredited?"

They're together in the edit bay, where Rachel was just dying to show Quinn the stringout she's put together of prospective contestants. That is until one minor quibble over what qualifies as a proper academic background set Rachel off on a tangent.

She's as easily distracted as a kitten in a yarn factory.

"I don't know, Rachel, Jesus." Quinn pushes her way in front of the keyboard, nudging Rachel's hand away from the space bar to hit play. "I'm not giving the woman a passport. She's just a host. She's cute and she can speak, what more do you want?"

"Such standards."

Rachel looks as though she wants to say more -- something droll and biting, with accompanying eye rolling -- but a prospective contestant has appeared on screen, interview narrated by questions from Jay, and they both go silent.

*

Like everything Goldberg does when she sets her mind to it, the selection and structure is brilliant.

Quinn can't help but smile as she gives Rachel's thigh an appreciative little squeeze.

Rachel doesn't look away from the screen, barely blinks, but she's smiling too.

*

_"I have dreams, sure,"_ the girl on the monitor is saying. _"Doesn't everyone?"_

"My god," Quinn laughs into her glass of bourbon as Rachel slowly nods. "She's perfect."

Sometimes the easiest lies are the ones that we're ready to tell all on our own, no evolution required. Some people are just born ready to be made into verbs.

Lust, break, fuck, trust.

"What can I say?" Rachel taps the space bar gingerly. "We make a great team."


End file.
